Social Media in Marketing Hospitality and Tourism.

Read the whole talk so you would know what the answer is to that pick-up line.

Special Note: This is edited for the benefit of the blog reader. The live talk is more exciting and interactive.

Okay, for those of you who don’t know yet, I received an invite to talk about “SOCIAL MEDIA IN MARKETING HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM” during the “1st Capiz Tourism Week” that happened last September 24-29, 2012. I said yes and prepared my presentation for the said event. As many would like to know what I talked about, I want to share some with you (you can invite me to talk about this if you have a same event too).

Who among you here have a Facebook account? Twitter? Multiply? Friendster? Four square? Who uses Wikipedia for research? Who watches or uploads videos on Youtube? Do you use Instagram? Flickr?

All of the students raised their hands not once but many times. It is just apt to say that everyone is involved with social media, yes, everyone whether you like it or not.

Fact 1: Today there are 900 million internet users and counting…

This is the reason why marketing nowadays is different 5 or 10 years ago. Everyone is using mobile internet and surprisingly, people spend more time online compared to let’s say watching TV. I wonder if teenagers still read newspaper.

Fact 2: New Media is in, Traditional Media is ________.

Let’s set the parameters here and try to make a working definition of the topic “SOCIAL MEDIA IN MARKETING HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM”

Hospitality- I have been to some SEA countries and I would really say that Filipinos are the most hospitable of all. Hands down! Even the foreign backpackers I met along the way says that no country can beat genuine Filipino hospitality. I can attest to that!

Tourism- Commercial organization and operation of vacations and visit to places of interest.

Some of the 900++ faculty and students who attended the “1st Western Visayas Teachers and Students Tourism and Hospitality Convention”

HOW DOES SOCIAL MEDIA WORK?

Someone posts a photo of a certain place.

Friends will like, comment and share the photo.

Friends would like to experience the place too.

Friends will visit the place.

Friends will post the photos.

The cycle continues.

Now make this cycle big, say a marketing company does this using the power of celebrities.

Fact 3: Gone are the days when people visit a travel and tour office to book a flight or tour to somewhere. When someone wants to go somewhere, he turns on his laptop and types that place on Google. Some even makes a status message about that place.

Let’s see some examples of promotion using the social media

1. Bayo Commercial (2012), made viral because of people’s outrage.

2. Magnum Ice Cream (2012), viral internet campaign. The day after Magnum was publicly offered it was sold-out.

3. The Best Job in the World (2009). The Best Social Marketing Campaign yet.

35,000 people from 200 countries applying for the awesome job

Queensland Tourism Website viewed 2.3 million times in two weeks time

1,100 TV placements in the US within 2 days

over $11 million worth of exposure

Australia tourism down, but Queensland tourism up 20%

50% of Australia trips now include a Queensland component

Here’s the video that started it all:

I should have quoted this from UTALKMARKETING but because of time constraint I went on my talk.

But rather than advertise the campaign just through traditional means, the tourism board asked prospective employees to post one-minute application videos to YouTube, from which the 50 finalists were selected.

The result was a virtual chain reaction that bought the campaign more exposure than any traditional ad campaign could: Applicants started Facebook groups in support of their efforts; friends posted links to the videos on the micro-blogging site Twitter; a flurry of resulting visits overwhelmed the campaign’s website, crashing it on multiple occasions.

Aside from TV coverage from every news service from the BBC to CNN, radio and newspaper coverage, the campaign has been the catalyst for special online discussion groups, bulletin boards, blogs and websites, with applicants critiquing their competition, having detailed discussions and swapping ideas and tips.

It’s not surprising that the campaign has largely relied on public relations and social networking activity. It’s captured the imagination of the world and to date it’s generated more than $70-million in publicity value, according to Queensland Tourism.

10 BENEFITS OF USING SOCIAL MEDIA IN MARKETING HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM

Less Expensive

Worldwide Reach

Longer Lasting Presence

Super Fast

Superior Customer Relations

Mobile

Sell Products More Human and Interactive Way –

Measurable Results

Spy on the Competition

Share Information / Collaboration

Then I encourage them to start using SOCIAL MEDIA for the betterment of others.

What better way to end the talk by sharing a personal testimony of my journey from an unemployed individual to a successful travel blogger (writing this on my blog is kinda awkward, forgive the bragging please, I didn’t mean to offend you, I just want to inspire the young).

Three years ago, I stopped working (I was a P.E. Teacher and some kind of a Guidance Counselor, we call it Prefect of Discipline). I have three passion: Running, Surfing and Traveling (you can also add drinking coffee if you want), so I asked myself how to do these three and actually get paid for doing it. I’m not that fast in running; in surfing I’m no PRO but I guess I have made traveling on a budget both science and art because of my experiences.

So when my savings are about to become depleted I challenged myself on a 14-day Western Visayas Backpacking with only Php250 budget to spare, all-in. That was a success story and from that day I said to myself to focus on this and commit to blog about my adventures. It was really hard at the beginning but I have to make ends meet. Because of its success, a lot of opportunities came. Until I became the official blogger for Philippine Sports Committee during the Philippine National Games and Batang Pinoy 2011.

I shared to them the story of the “SHOE SHARING PROJECT“ we did to help the young athletes of Bayawan City, Negros Oriental.

Then I seized the power of the internet and asked the help of my friends by helping Rizal Elementary School in Gubat, Sorsogon have their school library (after not having a library for the past 50 years).

I showed them the video from TV5:

I ended the talk with these words, “USE SOCIAL MEDIA TO INSPIRE THE YOUNG AND TOUCH PEOPLE’S LIVES.”

THANKS TO CAPIZ TOURISM OFFICE

I had a great experience during my talk at La Hacienda, the more than 900 electrifying students from Iloilo, Aklan and Capiz were so interactive I didn’t want to stop sharing my thoughts on the topic.

Btw, it should be Christel James Betia (with an H). Now you guys know my complete name.

Words are not enough to thank Capiz Tourism Office, headed by Sir Al Tesoro, for the great opportunity you guys gave me. Until next time? I hear they are planning to make this a national event next year.